: 


YOUNG  GIRL 


HILDEGARDE  PLANNER 


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192,0 


THE 

SEASON'S 


1921 


GREETINGS 

FROM 

H.S.CROCKER  CO.,  INC 


SAN  FRANCISCO 

CALIFORNIA 

U.  S.  A. 


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YOUNG  GIRL 


YOUNG  GIRL 

AWARDED  THE  EMILY  CHAMBERLAIN  COOK  PRIZE 
AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA, 

AND  OTHER  F>OEMS 


BY  HlLDEGARDE  PLANNER 


WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION  AND  DECORATIONS 
BY  PORTER  GARNETT 


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SAN  FRANCISCO 
PRINTED  FOR  PRIVATE  DISTRIBUTION  BY 

H.S.CROCKER  COMPANY, INCORPORATED 
MDCCCCXX 


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COPYRIGHT,  1920, 
by  HILDEGARDE  PLANNER 


INTRODUCTION 

THE  publication  of  this  volume  of  verse 
by  Miss  Hildegarde  Planner  has  been  un- 
dertaken by  the  Crocker  Press  not  only 
because  some  of  the  poems  it  contains  were 
selected  by  the  committee  of  award  for  the 
Cook  Prize  at  the  University  of  California,  but 
also  because  Miss  Planner's  poetry  has  proved 
with  such  frequency  its  power  to  move  and  to 
give  pleasure  to  persons  who  .have  read  it,  or 
who  have  heard  it  read.  The  publishers  feel, 
moreover,  that  the  selection  is  an  appropriate 
one  because  it  is  representative  of  California. 
Although  the  author  is  not  a  Californian  by 
birth,  the  poems  here  collected  were  all  written 
while  she  was  a  student  at  Berkeley,  and  to 
claim  them  therefore  as  Californian  is  not  per- 
haps a  too  flagrant  exhibition  of  that  acquisi- 
tiveness for  literary  and  artistic  personalities 
with  which  we  of  the  extreme  West  have,  at 
times  and  not  without  some  color  of  truth,  been 
charged.  But  the  point  is  not  an  important  one, 
for,  since  these  poems  have  come  out  of  Cali- 
fornia, and  since,  in  thought  and  atmosphere, 
they  so  subtly  refledl  their  provenience,  may 

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we  not  offer  them  here  as  a  gift  from  this  far 
shore,  with  confidence  that  they  will  in  the  fu- 
ture speak  for  our  desire  to  foster  creative  abil- 
ity that  is  unfolded  among  us  though  it  be  not 
native  to  our  soil  ? 

There  is  in  this  approaching  voice  a  fresh 
music  that  is  quite  its  own.  Its  cadences,  never 
severely  patterned,  possess  an  unfailing  grace, 
and  match  a  sensitive  word-play,  which  in  ap- 
perceptive  images,  gives  us  a  spontaneous  and 
valid  transcription  of  emotion  and  expresses  a 
vision  at  once  various,  intense,  and  delicate. 
This  nai've  but  illuminating  diftion  is  secure  in 
the  poet's  instinctive  acceptance  of  the  artist's 
obligation  to  express  himself  always  with  sin- 
cerity, personality,  and  style,  and  we  welcome 
in  the  freshness  of  her  images  a  happy  avoid- 
ance of  imitative  thought,  of  the  approximate 
phrase,  and  of  the  cliche. 

The  typographic  and  decorative  dress  with 
which  these  lyrics  have  been  clothed  will,  we 
hope,  appeal  to  the  friends  of  the  Crocker  Press 
as  an  earnest  and  conscientious  effort  to  main- 
tain a  worthy  standard  in  "  the  art  preservative 
of  all  the  arts/' 

PORTER  GARNETT. 


Vlll 


CONTENTS 

YOUNG  GIRL 

This  Morning 
Garden 
Mood 
Confession 


OTHER  POEMS 
Discovery 

Birch  Grove" — Boris  Anisfeld 
The  Singer 
Birds 


Ihe  committee  of  award  for  the  Emily  Chamberlain 

Cook  prize  consisted  of  Professor  Harold  L.  Bruce, 

Mr.  Edgar  Lee  Masters,  and  Professor  Paid  Shorey. 

Acknowledgments  for  printing  some  of  the 

poems  in  this  volume  are  made  to  the  University 

of  California  Chronicle,  the  Occident, 

and  the  New  York  Tribune. 


V 


THIS  MORNING 

AFTER  the  emotion  of  rain 
The  mist  parts  across  the  morning 
Like  the  smile  of  one 
Who  has  laughed  in  sleep 
And  cannot  remember  why. 

The  damp  road  companions  my  feet 

And  is  a  friend  to  every  step. 

Above  me  winter  goldfinches 

Cling  like  fruit 

To  the  delighted  birch  trees ; 

And  the  studious  earth, 

Thinking  what  flowers  to  speak  in  next, 

Moves  restlessly  with  small,  wise  birds 

Who  read  the  tucks  in  the  moss, 

The  symbols  on  the  beetle-wings, 

And  the  comedies  on  pink  and  yellow  pebbles, 

Which  I  am  too  tall  to  see. 


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OME  day  I  might  die 

For  fear  they  cannot  hear  me  laugh 
When  I  am  being  buried, 

Come  and  be  merry  on  my  grave, 

O  cerise  and  yellow  darlings, 

So  that  my  friends  may  say, 

"It  seems  to  me  I  hear  her  voice/' 


«l 


II.  COLUMBINE 

THERE  is  an  eager  hillside 
Thirsting  to  a  lake, 
And  on  the  sands  a  hundred  toads 
Trilling  to  awake 

A  band  of  ghosts  with  yellow  brows 
Who  stretch  green  hands  and  rise 
To  look  along  their  happy  limbs 
With  cherry-colored  eyes. 


III.  NASTURTIUM 

T  SHALL  hide  my  discretion 
1  In  your  willing  brightness 
And  give  you  to  a  snail  to  hold, 

ill  And  say' 

1  'Catch  me  if  you  can, 

I  am  going  to  China/' 

IV.  TIGRIDIA 

LET  three  naked  men 
Carry  me  across  the  jungle. 
There  is  a  broken  temple 
Where  I  must  meet  the  new  moon 
At  sunrise. 

V.  PURPLE  IRIS 

T  COULD  drown 
1  In  one  deep  petal. 


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THEY  say  that  my  grandmother  often 
picked  you 

And  placed  your  quaint  perfume 
At  her  tight  girdle. 


My  grandmother 

Did  Vergil  into  French 

And  then  had  seven  children. 


. . . .  I  shall  not  pick  you, 
Dianthus. 


YOU  must  have  more  wisdom  than  any, 
For  the  sun  tells  you 
What  God  says, 
And  the  wild  canaries  tell  you 
What  it  is 

To  be  a  yellow  motion 
In  the  air. 


MOOD 


MY  shadow  going  on  before 
Flutters  like  a  leaf, 
But  it  can  never  reach  the  door 
Before  my  grief. 

My  grief  goes  first  and  takes  the  key 
To  open  the  door  and  welcome  me. 
He  offers  me  a  lonely  cup 
Full  of  lily  wine 

And  says,  "Come  sister,  share  this  drink, 
Yours  and  mine/' 
He  weds  a  pale  blue  candle 
To  a  loving  flame 
And,  holding  it  before  his  lips, 
Breathes  over  it  my  name. 
He  lays  his  forehead  to  my  knee 
And  I  stroke  his  sorrowing  hair. 
The  look  of  it  beneath  my  hands 
Is  soft  and  fair. 

He  opens  his  mouth  and  sings  one  note 
That  strikes  like  rain  against  my  throat  ; 
Then  he  leads  me  jealously  to  bed, 
Lest  I  meet  my  dreams  uncompanied  ____ 
What  a  desolate  thing  my  house  would  be 
If  grief  werejiot  there  to  welcome  me. 


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CONFESSION 

THERE  is  an  angel 
Whose  thoughts  at  morning 
Are  like  a  newly  broken  pomegranate, 
And  whose  words  at  noon 
Are  golden  ice 
Warmed  into  music. 

There  is  an  angel 

Whose  eyes  are  like  fuchsias 

Whoever  sits  beneath  them 

Desires  forthwith  to  be  a  passionate  vine 

And  bear  a  flower. 

There  is  an  angel 

Whose  steps  are  slower  than  white  clover, 

For  each  motion 

Is  so  heavy  with  beauty 

That  swiftness  dies  beneath  the  burden. 


But  I  would  rather  live  blessedly  with  you 

Than  go  expectantly  to  heaven. 


DISCOVERY 

UNTI L  my  lamp  and  I 
Stood  close  together  by  the  glass, 
I  had  not  ever  noticed 
I  was  a  comely  lass. 

My  aunts  have  always  nodded, 

"  Sweet  child, 

She  has  a  gentle  soul 

And  mild/' 

And  so,  one  night, 

I  took  my  lamp  and  said 

"  I'll  look  upon  my  gentle  soul 

Before  I  go  to  bed. " 

I  could  not  find  it ;  no, 
But  gazing  hard  I  spied 
Something  much  more  near  to  me, 
White  armed  and  amber-eyed. 

And  as  I  looked  I  seemed  to  feel 
Warm  hands  upon  my  breast, 
Where  never  any  hands  but  mine 
Were  known  to  rest. 


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And  as  I  looked  my  startled  thoughts 
Winged  up  in  happy  flight, 
And  circled  like  mad  butterflies 
About  the  light. 

I  went  to  bed  without  my  soul, 
And  I  had  no  mind  to  care, 
For  a  joyful  little  sin 
Slept  pillowed  on  my  hair. 

I  went  to  bed  without  my  soul— 
What  difference  to  me? — 
I  had  a  joyful  little  sin 
For  company. 

And  that  is  what  came  of  listening 
To  aunts  who  always  lied. 
They  never  told  me  that  I  was 
White  armed  and  amber-eyed. 


"BIRCH  GROVE"— Boris  Amsfeld 

tfje  peins  ce  que  je  sens,  pas  ce  que  je  vots." 

I  CANNOT  find  a  path  there 
For  mortal  feet  at  all, 
Where  the  shepherd  boy  is  golden  air 
And  the  leaves  are  a  waterfall. 

I  cannot  wantonly  intrude 
Into  that  pagan  solitude, 
Where  little  dream-goats  in  a  row 
Trot  quaintly,  primly  to  and  fro. 

One  hand  upraised  would  be  to  crush 
The  wonder-strung  fragility 
Of  trees  that  with  a  slow,  still  rush 
Flow  down  from  high  infinity. 

There  is  a  chain  I  cannot  sever .... 

There  is  a  wall  that  never,  never 

I  watch  the  little  dream-goats  pace 
Within  that  dim  and  dryad  place. 


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THE  SINGER 

SOME  one  is  coming  down  the  street 
singing 
With  his  carol-book  held  out  to  you. 
Come  and  lean  against  his  broad,  dusty 
shoulder. 


He  sings  the  beautiful,  gnarled  hands  of 

factories 

And  the  eyes  that  shine  in  a  dark  slum. 
He  sings  a  mighty  melody  for  friendship 
And  a  tender  consolation  for  dishonor. 

He  sings  valleys  that  hide  the  foxes, 
Yellow  pools  along  the  sea-beach. 
The  red  gates  of  day 
And  the  black  gates  of  prisons, 
With  always  and  always  the  same  refrain- 
Democracy,  Myself,  America! 


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BIRDS 

BELOVED,  the  black  swans  of  my  eyes 
Are  loosed  to  your  behest, 
And  must  I  still  keep  caged  from  you 
The  white  swans  of  my  breast  ? 

My  hands,  like  slender  pigeons, 
Flutter  the  whole  day  through. 
Did  you  not  know  the  little  things 
Home  unto  you  ? 

My  lips,  like  slim  canaries, 
Sing  when  I  hear  you  speak. 
Beloved,  bend  and  stroke  once  more 
The  finches  of  my  cheek. 


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PRINTED  AT  SAN  FRANCISCO 

IN  THE  MONTH  OF  NOVEMBER.  MDCCCCXX 

BY  H.  S.  CROCKER  COMPANY.  INCORPORATED 

THE  TYPOGRAPHY  DESIGNED 

BY  PORTER  GARNETT 


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